Taliban Defiant Despite Raids

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Taliban Defiant Despite Raids

KABUL – U.S. bombs and missiles rained on Kabul and other Afghan cities for a third straight night through to Wednesday as the prime target in the war on terrorism responded with chilling defiance.

The attacks have targeted defensive positions of the ruling Taliban and suspected bases of Osama bin Laden as a softening up process while Washington presses ahead with a promise to get the Saudi-born militant "dead or alive."

A spokesman for bin Laden and his al Qaida network – blamed by the United States for the devastating September 11 suicide plane attacks on New York and Washington – said it was every Muslim's duty to fight against the U.S.

"Americans should know, the storm of the (hijacked) planes will not stop," al Qaida spokesman Sulaiman Bu Ghaith said in a video statement broadcast by Qatar's Al Jazeera television early on Wednesday morning.

"American interests are spread everywhere in the world. Every Muslim should carry out his full role towards his nation and his religion. Terrorism against oppressors is a belief in our religion and our teachings."

Al Qaida, which operates from bases inside Afghanistan, was the brainchild of millionaire fugitive bin Laden, who lives in the country as a guest of the Taliban.

The Taliban also vowed revenge, pledging over two million Afghan lives in a Jihad (holy struggle) against what they call U.S. terrorism.

"We are determined to offer two million more martyrs for independence and sovereignty if need be," Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, the Taliban's ambassador to Islamabad, told a news conference.

A cruise missile had earlier slammed into a house once used by Mullah Mohammad Omar, supreme leader of the hardline Islamic movement, but he was not there, Mullah Zaeef said.

Another hit the Kabul office of a U.N.-funded mine clearance group – a crucial project in one of the world's most heavily mined countries – and killed four men who worked there.

PUPPET GOVERNMENT

Mullah Zaeef accused the United States of wanting to install a puppet government in Kabul to help U.S. companies tap the vast oil and gas resources of Central Asia via impoverished Afghanistan.

He was referring to the opposition Northern Alliance, which claimed on Tuesday to have seized control of the country's main north-south highway after persuading 40 Taliban commanders and their 1,200 fighters to switch sides.

"There wasn't any fighting, they basically came right over," said Dr Abdullah Abdullah, the foreign minister of the Northern Alliance which still holds Afghanistan's U.N. seat despite controlling less than 10 percent of the country.

If confirmed, the defections would deal a severe blow to the Taliban, who came to power in Kabul in 1996 and are now under attack from inside and out.

"It has put the Taliban in northern Afghanistan in a very difficult situation, the most difficult situation in all their years," Abdullah told Reuters.

The third night of U.S. President George W. Bush's war on terrorism began shortly before the evening curfew took effect, with warplanes and cruise missiles roaring through the clear night sky over the mountainous country.

Anti-aircraft guns began pounding into the skies above Kabul, but it was not immediately possible to determine what damage or casualties had been caused because of the curfew.

FLEEING DESPITE DEFIANCE

Despite the defiance of the Taliban's leadership, many ordinary Afghans were unwilling to spend another night of fear and have packed up their meager belongings into rolls, piled onto buses or donkey carts and fled.

"How long more do the Americans want us to suffer?" asked one anguished Kabul man on Tuesday. "We can't sleep ... we can't go to mosques to worship."

Zaeef said Tuesday's air strikes hit neither bin Laden nor the Taliban senior leadership in Kandahar, even though one missile hit a house formerly used by supreme leader Mullah Omar.

"Thanks be to God, they are alive and in Afghanistan," he said when asked about the world's most wanted men.

In Washington, U.S. defense officials said the raids had so far achieved all objectives and military sources said the operation was now likely to move into its next phase – possibly including ground forces.

That scenario is likely to appeal more to bin Laden, whose personal fortune and charisma has provided the Taliban with thousands of zealous foreign Muslim fighters – known collectively as "Arabs" regardless of their origin – and guaranteed their sanctuary.

After decades of war many Afghans are inured to conflict, but mainly infantry and artillery battles rather than the air blitz that the United States has unleashed.

Precise details of what damage the U.S.-led raids have caused so far are difficult to gather. The Taliban ordered all westerners out of the country weeks ago and are suspicious of television cameras.

Taliban authorities on Tuesday accused a second journalist caught in disguise after crossing from neighboring Pakistan of spying, saying his satellite telephone and tape recorders were espionage tools.

Michel Peyrard, 44, a reporter for the French weekly Paris Match, was wearing a traditional all-encompassing woman's burqa when arrested near the eastern city of Jalalabad.

British reporter Yvonne Ridley arrived in Pakistan on Monday following 10 days in a Kabul jail after being caught in similar disguise. She too had originally been accused of spying.

Westerners unfamiliar with burqas think they make the person inside almost invisible, but Afghans can often spot non-Afghans by their shoes or their walk.